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Do Not Push the Red Button
Does anyone remember the "Talk N' Play"? It was an interactive read-along audio tape player marketed to young children, first developed and manufactured by CBS Toys in 1984, then continued to be sold under Hasbro's Playskool brand until 1992. Most of the read-along tapes and picture books featured characters from the Disney and Sesame Street franchises. Children would follow these books and be told to press one of four different colored buttons to answer a question, solve a puzzle, or just listen to a character's monologue. Read-along storybooks and tapes were fairly common for children to have in the 1980's and 1990's, but the "Talk N' Play" set itself apart from the rest. The tapes for the "Talk N' Play" are unique in that there are 4 separate lines of sound on the track, making it possible to hear each line by pressing one of the four different colored buttons on the machine. For it's time, this was a highly innovative feature before CD-ROM's or even the Kindle was available for children's media. Of course, as you expected, I had the fortune of having a "Talk N' Play" when I was a child. From 1989 to 1992, I enjoyed having a "Talk N' Play" to keep me occupied when I got bored with playing my toys or when I bored playing the NES. I had a few Seasame Street storybooks and tapes I enjoyed listening to. "Can You Tell Me How to Get to Sesame Street?" and "Let's Play School" I enjoyed very much , and "Alvin and The Chipmunks in Concert" was my absolute favorite for the novelty songs featured on the tape. Good times, really. But I cannot forget my dreaded memory of "Do Not Push The Red Button". On my 7th birthday, after having the "Talk N' Play" for a while since last Christmas, I recieved the book and tape of "Lovable, Furry Old Grover in: Please Don't Push the Red Button". This was perplexing to me. Why would Grover not want anyone to press the red button? I immediately put the tape in and played along to find out. The story consisted of Grover in little vignettes telling me to press either the green, yellow, or blue buttons; but not the red one. Being the nice and obediant kid I was , I avoided pressing the red button all throughout, but I still didn't understand why Grover didn't want me to press it at all. I asked my parents, but they just humored me by shrugging and pretending not to know. This made my curiosity grow more morbid than ever. Later that night, before it was time for bed, I rewond the tape and replayed it with the red button pressed to hear what Grover would say after every prompt to push a button. On the first half of the story, Grover just gently reminded the listener, me, that "we are not pushing the red button today". Needless to say, I was disappointed, but still curious. However, on the page where I had to follow a maze out of the Count's castle, after the Count himself instructed "push a button now", what I heard took me by terrible surprise. Grover responded, "You pressed the red button again!", and then he screamed. Grover screamed so loud, it made the speaker crackle and it pierced my eardrums! "Apparently..." Grover continued, now heavily exasperated, "...you have never seen a lovable furry blue monster... lose his temper. It is not... a pretty sight." This was the first true hint I got as to why I shouldn't press the red button. I then remembered how scared I used to be when my mother would read to me "There's a Monster at the End of This Book", another picture book featuring Grover. All the dread I felt with each page my mother turned as we got closer to the end of that book was enough to fill my imagination with every nightmarish prediction possible. I'd get so scared, I yelled at my mother to put the book away, but instead she stroked my head and repeated, "It's okay, honey. It's not real. There's no such thing as monsters." She then gingerly revealed the last page showing that the only "monster" at the end of that book was Grover himself, looking embarrased and apologizing for making me feel scared. After recalling that memory and rediscovering the resolve I felt back then, I pressed onward to hear the rest of the "Talk N' Play" tape. The next page involved Cookie Monster making cookies in the kitchen, cookie dough everywhere and all. Grover was standing over the empty space where the red button should be, spilling something over it with a wooden spoon. That something, which was supposed to be just more cookie dough, was something... wrong. My eyes widened and my mouth felt dry when I realized what Grover was pouring over the empty space over the red button: a crimson mass containing an eyeball, a severed finger, and a pair of teeth still attached to bloody gum tissue. I was petrified! Why would Grover show me something so horrible like that as to discourage me from pressing the red button? I then heard Grover speak from the tape upon the promt to press a button, his voice sounding much deeper and more menacing that it didn't even sound like Frank Oz anymore. He said: "You're beginning to anger me, child. Turn the next few pages, if you want to know... why you shouldn't... press the red button." And I did as Grover ordered. The next page contained a more ghoulish scene. Simon Soundman, who played as a farmer on the next page, was missing. In the background, all over the tilled soil of the farmland were animal skeletons. They weren't tame-looking Muppet skeletons; they were realistic animal skeletons of cows, horses, chickens, and pigs. Bare grey bones with strands of pink sinew indicating that they've just been stripped of their flesh. I stared at this page for a good couple minutes, filled with dread and confusion. Simon Soundman was nowhere to be found, even if I clearly heard him narrate the scene as normal. But the song which used to be "A-Hunting We Will Go" was now replaced with a low, rumbling noise echoing as if in a wrought iron chamber. After a few seconds of listening to that haunting ambience, I jumped at the sound of another scream, followed by the sound of slicing, cracking, and dripping. The horrid image in my mind could not compare to what I saw in the book! After the dripping sound stopped, Grover spoke once again in that deep voice: "Turn the page." The next page showed Grover standing in an apartment living room holding a paint can. I knew from the first run that it was indeed red paint in that can, but after seeing him spill nasty gore from a wooden spoon and a bunch of rancid farm animal skeletons, I dreaded that it was something much worse this time around. Grover then said, this time in his normal voice, "What I am holding here... is a can of...", then cut to the deeper voice booming, "...OFFERINGS FOR KALI.", and then his normal voice saying, "I'll bet you aren't wondering what I'm about to do with it...?" I didn't even want to know anymore. I shut the tape off then and there and allowed the fear to wash over me, as I quietly crawled into bed. I never slept that whole night, shaking and chattering even while under two heavy blankets. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * The next morning, my mother came to see me in my bed and felt how dead cold I felt. She then took me to the emergency clinic to have a doctor examine me. I don't remember what the diagnosis was, but I later found out years later it was trauma-induced insomnia... which would then affect me thoughout my childhood and teenage years. I cannot tell you the number of years it took me to get over the horror instilled by Grover, that horrible monster at the end of that "Talk N' Play" book. All I can remember from the first "clean" read-along was that the last page showed Grover smearing the entire page with red paint and getting some paint on himself; while Prarie Dawn stood behind Grover and shrugged her shoulders. If you have an imagination as vivid as I do, then it's not hard to imagine what that last page would have looked like. Category:Creepypasta Category:Sesame Street Category:Sesame Workshop